Telephone directory assistance services have been available for the past century. While improvements have been made over the decades, such systems are still poorly suited for use by subscribers of cellular telephone services.
In prior art directory assistance services, a customer dials an operator and identifies the name and address of a party whose telephone number is desired. The operator then locates the number, using printed directories or a computer database, and provides the number to the customer. (The provision of the number is sometimes done by the live operator, but more typically is done with a computerized voice response unit that provides a synthesized voicing of the number.) After the customer's inquiry has been satisfied, the connection to the operator is terminated.
While satisfactory for most customers, this arrangement is ill-suited for many cellular telephone customers. For one, such customers are usually away from their general work environments (e.g. in a vehicle), and thus may not have ready access to a pencil and paper in order to make a note of the desired number. (Even if such materials are available, the customer may not find it convenient to interrupt other activities, e.g. driving, in order to make a note.) In addition, the process of initiating a second call--to the desired party--entails further manual operations (e.g. hanging up, waiting for another dial tone, and dialing) which may be a hindrance to the customer's other activities.
The present assignee, in the prior art, has redressed certain of these difficulties by providing a directory assistance service that eliminates the need to make a note of the desired number, or undertake a redialing exercise. Instead, after determining the telephone number desired by the customer, rather than voicing it to the customer, the directory assistance operator goes ahead and initiates a call to the desired party, and connects the new outgoing call to the original customer. (The operator may stay on the line as a conferenced party so as to provide further assistance, or may withdraw from the connection, depending on the particular implementation.) This arrangement obviates the need for the customer to make a note of the voiced number, or to undertake a redialing exercise. However, if the initiated call is not completed (e.g. a "busy" tone is received), or if the customer desires further directory assistance, then the customer must again call the directory assistance operator for help.
The problems associated with providing directory assistance services to cellular customers are not limited to hardships on the customers; the directory assistance service and the cellular carrier also confront unique issues. In the assignee's prior art system, for example, the cellular carrier (which is typically responsible for billing of the customer) knows only that the customer has dialed the directory assistance operator, but does not know the number to which the customer is ultimately connected by the operator. Billing is thereby complicated. In the prior art system, the toll charges (assuming toll calls are permitted; often they are not) for the connection between the customer and the desired number are simply absorbed by the directory assistance service, and recouped by billing the cellular carrier a sufficiently large flat rate charge for each directory assistance call so as to cover these costs. The cellular carrier then bills the subscriber a fixed amount for each directory assistance inquiry, regardless of the toll charges of any further connection established for the customer by the directory assistance operator. This arrangement, however, has a number of disadvantages. In addition to increased cost, it also fails to provide the cellular carrier useful information about its customers' calling patterns, which may affect decisions relating to system expansion, etc.
In accordance with one preferred embodiment of the present invention, a directory assistance service is provided which alleviates many of these drawbacks of the prior art. For example, in one embodiment, a customer who wishes directory assistance services is connected in the conventional manner to an operator who determines the destination telephone number desired by the customer. As in the prior art, the operator then initiates a call connecting the customer to the destination telephone number. However, rather than dropping all further involvement with the call, this embodiment of the present invention continually monitors the connection thereby established for a predetermined DTMF signal issued by the customer, such as that obtained by pressing the "*" button or some other button. If such a signal is detected, the customer is transferred to a directory assistance operator, who can then provide whatever further assistance is needed (e.g. redialing a busy number, or providing further directory assistance). By this arrangement, the press of a single button by the customer summons further directory assistance, rather than the redialing procedure required by the prior art.
The preferred embodiment further addresses the billing difficulties associated with completion of customer calls by directory assistance operators. According to this aspect of one preferred embodiment, the directory assistance service logs, in a billing database, information identifying the customer (i.e. the customer identification number accompanying the call from the cellular provider), the destination number to which the customer is connected, and the date, time and duration of the customer/destination number connection. This log of information is periodically provided to the cellular carrier, allowing it to bill the customer for the call connected by the directory assistance operator and recoup the associated expense. This permits the flat rate charged by the directory assistance provider to be reduced correspondingly, and provides the cellular service with more detailed information about its customers' usage requirements.
The foregoing and additional features and advantages of the present invention will be more readily apparent from the following detailed description, which proceeds with reference to the accompanying drawings.